teachers

Tenure is “Not a Shield for Incompetence”

Eduflack accountability, AFT, teachers
“We have made mistakes.  You have to really focus to make sure you’re doing everything you can so that kids are first.  Tenure, for example.  Make sure tenure is about fairness and make sure it’s not a shield for incompetence.”
– Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers, acknowledging in The Washington Post that “the unions have been too focused on fairness for their members and not necessarily quality in the schools.”

Do We Get CEUs For This?

Eduflack accountability, school boards, teachers

Down in Louisiana, Gov. Bobby Jindal has offered an education reform package that leaves most other state reform packages in the dust.  Eliminate tenure.  Overhaul how teachers are paid.  Offer families vouchers to send their kids to private and parochial schools.

And like most states that face such reform proposals, Louisiana’s teachers’ unions are none too happy.  Unions leaders are standing up to the reform proposal.  They are speaking out.  They are rallying the troops.
But in a new twist, the unions are also getting local school districts to close their schools so that teachers can go to the state capitol to protest.  Officially, these newly decided days off are billed as “professional development” days, as the Advocate reports.
According to Learning Forward, the nation’s premier organization focused on educator effectiveness, the definition of PD is “a comprehensive, sustained, and intensive approach to improving teachers’ and principals’ effectiveness in raising student achievement.”
Now Eduflack is all for everyone having the right to exercise their First Amendment rights and ensuring that their voice is heard during the legislative process.  But all this begs an important question.  Does protesting pending legislation, waving signs, speaking out to protect your benefits and the like, serve as a “comprehensive, sustained, and intensive approach” to raising student achievement?  Does it demand that taxpayers, through their local school boards, cancel school days for students and pay teachers to go exercise their lobbying rights?
And if it does, can one get CEU credits for lobbying state legislatures or marching against the governor?

Evaluatin’ Teaching Hoosiers

Eduflack accountability, teachers

No, it isn’t just states like New York and Connecticut that are currently focused on strengthening teacher evaluations and putting some real teeth into the process.  The good folks over at Hechinger Report have previously reported on similar efforts in Florida, Tennessee, and Wisconsin.  Next up … Indiana.

As Scott Elliott and Sarah Butrymowicz report:

Teachers across the state will be rated 1 through 4, with 1 being the lowest. Those ratings will be based in part on the test-scores of their students.

The ratings come with consequences.

Those who receive ineffective ratings can be dismissed at the end of the school year. After two years, anyone twice rated as needing improvement—teachers rated a 1 or 2—also can be fired. Teachers rated in the bottom two categories also can be blocked from receiving a raise.

“This is a culture shift,” said Mindy Schlegel, who leads a new division within the Indiana Department of Education focused on educator effectiveness. “This is saying, ‘If you’re not good, you don’t deserve a raise.’ ”

How significant is this change? Consider this: Currently, many teachers are not observed even once a year. Few are rated as ineffective.

The reform is championed by Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett, who thinks the current system, which leaves evaluation up to each school, does not address poor performance. He pointed to a study of a sample of school districts that showed 99 percent of teachers were rated effective.

Bennett calls that a “statistical impossibility.”

Some required reading, particularly for those who are seriously looking at how to make educator effectiveness efforts meaningful.

Lessons Learned from the School Board

Eduflack Parents, school boards, teachers

Earlier this week, the Falls Church City Council honored dear ol’ Eduflack for his “dedicated service” on the Falls Church City School Board, noting “the City is grateful for your serving the students of the City and making the City of Falls Church Public Schools one of the highest-ranking school systems in the United States.”

I am very proud of my school board service.  It was a privilege for me to serve in elected office, particularly when my charge was to ensure that every child received a world-class public education.  I was fortunate to work with two great superintendents, a phenomenal group of educators, engaged parents, and terrific fellow board members.
As a result, I come away with several key lessons learned:
1. Teachers are the engines of successful schools.  Teaching, particularly today, is one of the most challenging jobs out there.  For schools to succeed and children to achieve, we need excellent educators in every classroom.  Those educators must be empowered to do what is best for the students.  And those successful educators must be paid fairly.
2. If teachers are the engines, then parents are the gasoline.  In Falls Church, we benefited from intense family engagement, with parents eager to be a part of what was happening in their child’s classroom, school, or the community at large.  For ultimate success, teachers and parents must work in partnership to educate the child.
3. No excuses.  In our community, we expected all students to achieve.  We competed every year to have the highest high school graduation rate in the state or to be rated the highest achieving district in the DC area (at least according to The Washington Post).  We encouraged all students to take AP and IB courses throughout their high school careers.  AND we made it a school board priority for the school district to pay the fees for those AP and IB tests.  We could not let family income be a barrier to student achievement.
These are lessons that every community — urban, suburban, or rural — can all learn from.  The value of great educators.  The need for engaged parents.  The true belief that all can succeed.  Imagine how much could happen in public education if we all could adopt these simple lessons.
 
 

Ed Reform: Team Play or One-Man Band?

Eduflack accountability, Parents, teachers

Are teachers to blame for all that’s wrong with our public schools?  Of course not.  While many frustrated folks may want to put the blame squarely on the shoulders of educators, it simply isn’t the case.  There are too many factors in the mix for any one individual to bear all the blame.  

When we look at problems like achievement gaps and graduation rates, we know that these issues did not materialize overnight.  There is no one stakeholder to blame.  We all bear responsibility for our situation, be we parent or policymaker, educator or activist.
Why, then, is it OK for the defenders of the status quo to say that only teachers should be involved in education reform efforts?  
For years now, we have heard some educators say that those who are not in the classroom have no business engaging in school improvement efforts.  That this is only for teachers to solve.  The classroom educator knows best.
If teachers aren’t solely responsible for our K-12 ills, why would be possibly think that they are solely responsible for fixing all that’s wrong in our public schools?  It took a village to get us to our current level of educational mediocrity, and it will take a similar village to get us back on an upward trajectory.
As a parent, I have a responsibility to do everything possible to ensure my kids get the best public educations possible.  As a homeowner, I want to know that my local school district is excelling, exceeding expectations.  As a taxpayer, I expect my taxes are being well spent and my schools performing above the state mean.  And as an advocate, I demand that all children — regardless of their race, family income, or zip code — have access to great public schools.
Rather than looking to exclude key stakeholders from the ed reform discussion, we should instead be focused on how to build greater awareness and involvement from all of those in the educational village.  It is the only way we will make the progress needed … and it may be the one way we ensure that others at the table don’t place the blame solely at the feet of our teachers.  We all need to own the reform process.

Working with Unions on Reform

Eduflack accountability, AFT, teachers

Can real reforms, particularly those targeted at fundamental issues such as educator evaluation, be done in partnership with teachers, or must they be done in spite of teachers?  This has been a question asked over and over in recent years, usual with a poor answer that gets us back to the same question.

Of course teachers need to be part of the reform process.  Educators are the ones on the front lines, the ones who need to implement (with fidelity) the reforms and transformations that policymakers, parents, and educators themselves are seeking.  Excluding them from the process only likely sets us a process destined to fail.
Case in point, the New Haven Public Schools teacher evaluation system.  Here, the City of New Haven worked with the American Federation of Teachers to build a better mousetrap.  An effective evaluation model.  A system that prioritizes student performance above all.  A system that finally aligns our expectations with what is happening in the classroom.
And the system is starting to show its potential.  Nicholas Kristof at The New York Times has also taken notice, penning an interesting piece on “The New Haven Experiment.”
From Kristof:

Yet reformers like myself face a conundrum. Teachers’ unions are here to stay, and the only way to achieve systematic improvement is with their buy-in. Moreover, the United States critically needs to attract talented young people into teaching. And that’s less likely when we’re whacking teachers’ unions in ways that leave many teachers feeling insulted and demoralized.

The breakthrough experiment in New Haven offers a glimpse of an education future that is less rancorous. It’s a tribute to the savvy of Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers and as shrewd a union leader as any I’ve seen. She realized that the unions were alienating their allies, and she is trying to change the narrative.

Yes, the model itself is a remarkable step forward for public education.  But it is particularly refreshing to see NHPS, Mayor John DeStephano (New Haven is a mayoral control district), the AFT, and the New Haven Federation of Teachers working together to develop, implement, improve, and maintain.  
As Kristof notes, “It’ll take years to verify that students themselves are benefiting, but it’s striking that teachers and administrators alike seem happy with the new system.  They even say nice things about each other.  In many tough school districts, teachers are demoralized and wilted; that feels less true in New Haven.”
Indeed.  If only all reforms could work this way.


How Tenure Reform Can Improve Teaching

Eduflack accountability, teachers

Does tenure reform denigrate the teaching profession?  Earlier this week, Eduflack spotlighted teacher tenure proposals offered up in Connecticut.  The significance of this is that Connecticut is a true-blue state, Dem legislature, Dem governor, with strong teachers unions.  So efforts to eliminate “life-long tenure” demand one stand up and take notice.

A valued reader, though, commented that such an approach must mean that Eduflack is anti-teacher.  Nothing could be furthest from the truth (if I were, I don’t think my teacher mother would let me come home for Christmas).  But I do believe, as Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy does, that one can be both pro-teacher and pro-reform. 
As I’ve written on these electronic pages many a time, there are few professions as demanding, as necessary, and as downright hard as teaching.  Far too many of us (Eduflack included) are just not cut out to be classroom teachers.  Those who enter the profession do not do so for the pay, the pensions, or other such considerations.  They do so to make a difference in the lives of kids, no matter how difficult it may be.
In return, they get low pay.  They get berated by parents.  They get attacked in the media.  They become the punchlines for jokes and the targets of horrible urban legends.  
Just last year, as a leader on a local school board, my district was working hard to find a way to provide raises to our educators, who had seen there salaries frozen for several previous years.  We did give them the pay increases they deserved (or at least a start to what they deserved), but along the way, I heard some choice words from constituents about how teachers don’t work full time and how they deserve low pay because they have those “huge” pensions coming to them.  To folks like that, teachers are simply a commodity, not a partner in the process.
But I digress.  If done correctly, efforts such as tenure reform can return a needed level of professionalism and respect to the teaching profession.  Yes, tenure is earned.  Yes, any teacher worth her salt is doing everything possible to encourage learning in her classroom.  So why not have that check-in every five years to ensure that a tenured teacher remains on task?  Use the process to applaud the leaders, while helping provide additional resources and supports to those who may be struggling.
Ultimately, tenure reform is a necessary component to current efforts to focus on educator quality.  We start with certification, and what is necessary to gain entrance to the classroom.  It is followed by educator evaluations and those measures necessary to determine if effective learning is happening in our classrooms.  And it is followed by a tenure process that incorporates the key tenets of that evaluation system and ensures those goals are embedded in keeping our best educators in their classrooms for their entire careers.
Certification reform is about getting the highest-quality teachers in the classroom, dispelling the myth any warm body can teach.  Educator evaluation is about demonstrating the effectiveness of our teaching force, not about targeting teachers for dismissal.  And tenure reform is about demonstrating the effectiveness of all our instructional leaders, not about taking away benefits or collective bargaining rights.
For far too many, education reform is seen as a punitive action, as an effort to assault our classrooms and attack our teachers.  And yes, in some instances, that has indeed been the case.  But it does not and should not be that way.  At its heart, education reform is about strengthening the teaching profession while improving the learning processes for all of our students.
Real reform, real school improvement, cannot happen without educators.  Our teachers and principals cannot do it half way, they can’t sit on the sidelines and hope to wait out reforms, and they certainly can’t ignore the proposed changes.  They need to be full partners in the process, and agents for improvement in the classroom.  We need to trust all educators to implement with fidelity, and we need to provide them the resources and supports to do it right.
To get there, we need to continue to build a public confidence in our educators.  We need to demonstrate that the strongest, most effective teachers are teaching “my” kids.  To do that, we need to use the continuum of certification, evaluation, and tenure.  All teachers — from first years to veterans — should be held to the highest standards.  They should be evaluated every year.  Those who need additional supports should get it.  And those who are exemplary should be rewarded for it.  
Most educators I talk to are not afraid of such measurements or such expectations.  They just ask that it be applied fairly and with a common sense that can often be lacking in public education.  Couldn’t agree more.
  

Teacher Tenure Reform in Blue

Eduflack accountability, teachers

What does tenure reform look like, particularly in a blue state with strong teachers unions?  Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy offered up a glimpse of the future of tenure today as part of his State of the State Address.

Rather than summarize, let’s read from one governor who is jumping to the top of the “ed reform guv” lists.

But we must do one more thing.

 

I’m a Democrat.  I’ve been told that I can’t, or shouldn’t, touch teacher tenure.  It’s been said by some that I won’t take on the issue because it will damage my relationship with teachers.

 

If the people in this chamber — and those watching on TV or online, or listening on the radio – if you’ve learned nothing else about me in the past 13 months, I hope you’ve learned this: I do what I say I’m going to do, and I do what I think is right for Connecticut, irrespective of the political consequences.

 

And so when I say it’s time we reform teacher tenure, I mean it. 

 

And when I say I’m committed to doing it in the right way, I mean it. 

 

Since 2009, 31 states have enacted tenure reform, including our neighboring states of New York, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island.  It’s time for Connecticut to act.

 

For those watching or listening who don’t know what tenure is, it’s basically job security.  Let me explain.

 

Right now, if you’re a teacher and you have tenure, your performance in the classroom has to be rated “incompetent” before a dismissal process can even begin.  Even then – even if you’re rated “incompetent” – it can take more than a year to dismiss you.

 

And to earn that tenure – that job security – in today’s system basically the only thing you have to do is show up for four years.  Do that, and tenure is yours.

 

The bottom line?  Today tenure is too easy to get and too hard to take away.

 

I propose we do it a different way.  I propose we hold every teacher to a standard of excellence.

 

Under my proposal, tenure will have to be earned and re-earned.  Not earned simply by showing up for work – earned by meeting certain objective performance standards, including student performance, school performance, and parent and peer reviews.

 

And my proposal says, you should not only have to prove your effectiveness once, after just a few years in the classroom.  My proposal says that if you want to keep that tenure, you should have to continue to prove your effectiveness in the classroom as your career progresses.

 

I’m trying to be careful in explaining this tenure reform proposal because I know there are those who will deliberately mischaracterize it in order to scare teachers.  So let me be very clear: we are not talking about taking away teachers’ rights to a fair process if an objective, data-driven decision is made to remove them from the classroom.

 

I believe deeply in due process.

 

I believe just as deeply that we need to ensure that our children are being taught only by very good teachers.

 

So for those teachers who earn tenure – by proving that they are effective teachers – it’s the job of the local school district to make sure that you have every chance to continue to succeed.  That means that if you start to struggle at any point after you’ve earned tenure, the district will provide support and professional development to help get you back on track.

 

And finally, my proposal says that we need to do a better job of recognizing our great teachers.  That’s why I’m proposing to allow local school districts, if they so choose, to provide career advancement opportunities and financial incentives as a way of rewarding teachers who consistently receive high performance ratings.

 

Over the next few weeks, we’ll continue to have this discussion about tenure and I’m confident we can put in place a system that best serves our students, and their teachers.

 

Now let me be clear: in having that discussion, Connecticut will not join the states trying to demonize and antagonize their way to better results. 

 

And we won’t get drawn into making a false choice between being pro-reform or pro-teacher. 

 

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, I am both. 

 

I’m pro-teacher, as long as that doesn’t mean defending the status quo, and I’m pro-reform, as long as that isn’t simply an excuse to bash teachers. 

Game on, Connecticut!

“Teachers Matter”

Eduflack accountability, Achievement gap, assessment, AYP, Obama, teachers

Last evening, President Barack Obama delivered his State of the Union Address to Congress and the nation.  The speech focused on the four pillars the President and his team see as necessary for turning around the United States and strengthening our community and our economy.  No surprise for those following the pre-game shows, education stood as one of those four pillars.

Five paragraphs committed to education.  One pointing out our states and districts are cutting education budgets when we should be strengthening them.  One on the importance of teachers.  One on high school dropouts.  Two on higher education and how we fund a college education.  (We have a sixth if you include the President’s call to do something to help hard-working students who are not yet citizens.)
So let’s go ahead and dissect what the President offered up last evening.
“Teachers matter.”
Absolutely.  No question about it.  We cannot and should not reform our K-12 educational systems without educators.  Teachers (and I would add, principals) are the single-greatest factor in education improvement.  They need to be at the table as we work toward the improved educational offerings the President and so many other dream of.
“So instead of bashing them, or defending the status quo, let’s offer schools a deal.  Give them the resources to keep good teachers on the job, and reward the best ones.”
Sign me up.  As the son of two educators, the last thing I want to do is bash a teacher (I’ll get in trouble with my mom if I do).  As I’ve said many times on this blog, teaching — particularly in this day and age — is one of the most difficult professions out there.  Most people aren’t cut out to do it, or at least do it well.  We need to make sure our precious tax dollars are being directed at recruiting, retaining, and supporting great teachers.  We should reward classroom excellence with merit pay and other acknowledgements.  But the President is also right in noting we cannot defend the status quo.  We can no longer debate whether reform is necessary.  Reform is necessary.  The discussion must now shift to how we change how we teach, not whether we change.
“In return, grant schools flexibility: To teach with creativity and passion; to stop teaching to the test; and to replace teachers who just aren’t helping kids learn.”
Yes, yes, yes.  Great educators know how to help virtually all kids learn.  They know to tailor their instruction based on data and other research points.  We should be encouraging that and empowering teachers to do so each and every day.  But we can’t lose sight of that last clause (and many may have missed it last night over the cheap applause line of not teaching to the test).  We must “replace teachers who just aren’t helping kids learn.”  In our quest for a great educator in every classroom, we must also realize not everyone is cut out to teach.  We need serious educator evaluation systems that ensure everyone is evaluated, everyone is evaluated every year, and those evaluations are based primarily on student learning.  And, like it or not, student performance tests still remain the greatest measure we have for student learning.  So if we can’t get struggling educators the professional development and support necessary to excel in the classroom, we need to be prepared to transition them out of the school.       
And lastly, President Obama’s “bold” call to action to ensure every student is college and career ready.
“I call on every State to require that all students stay in high school until they graduate or turn eighteen.” 
And here we have the President’s big educational swing and a miss.  This is a process goal, not an outcomes goal.  Based on AYP figures and recent on school improvement and turnaround, we know that far too many kids — particularly those from historically disadvantaged populations — are attending failing schools.  This is particularly true of secondary school students.  
Why force a student to stay in a school that has long been branded a “drop-out factory?”  Why keep a kid in school until he is 18 when he only reading at the grade level of an eight-year-old?  Why stick around for a high school diploma when it also requires massive remediation to attend a postsecondary institution?
No, the call should not be to require students to stick around a bad situation, giving us nothing more than a process win.  Instead, we should be focused on improving the outcomes of high school.  How do we demonstrate the relevance of a high school curriculum?  How do we engage kids?  How do we provide choices for a meaningful high school education?  How do we show the college and career paths that come from earning that diploma?  How do we make kids see they want to stick around, and don’t have to be mandated to do so?
At this point in time, we all realize that a high school diploma is the bare minimum to participate in our economy and our society.  For most, some form of postsecondary education is also necessary.  Until we improve the quality and direction of our high schools — and help kids see that dropping out is never a viable option — that mandatory diploma will be nothing more than a certificate of attendance.  We need to make a diploma something all kids covet … not a mandatory experience like going to the dentist.